Dragonborn in Westeros
by Duesal Bladesinger
Summary: Colin didn't know who he pissed off, but he woke up cold and hungry in the middle of a snowy wasteland. Being the Dragonborn really sucked sometimes. [A Dragonborn appears Beyond the Wall story.]
1. Colin Stormcrown

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Skyrim or _A Song of Ice and Fire_ , I just like playing around with their characters. Credit goes where credit is due.

 **Summary:** Colin didn't know who he pissed off, but he woke up cold and hungry in the middle of a snowy wasteland. Being the Dragonborn really sucked sometimes. [A Dragonborn appears Beyond the Wall story.]

 **Rating:** Mature

 **Author's Note:** This is exactly what it sounds like: the Dragonborn being shoved into Westeros. Now for a big thank you to my friend _Igornerd_ who helped me write and polish this into something worth reading.

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 **Dragonborn in Westeros**

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Chapter 1

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 **Colin Stormcrown**

" _Son of a_ —"

Colin jerked awake to a freezing wind. He yelped with discomfort as he squirmed to his feet and looked around with wild eyes, pulling his cloak tightly around himself in a desperate attempt to ward off the cold. It didn't work, and he swore as the winds howled and battered at his body.

There were no major landmarks as far as he could tell. No lighthouses or Mage's Colleges, no evil vampire fortresses. Not even roads or simple trails to follow. Just snow, ice, and lots of rocky hills. It was like a cross between the Reach and the Pale. What mountains he could see, he didn't recognize. They were strange to him. Too white, too lifeless. Even the skies were a solid grey with clouds and swirling snow.

"Where the hell am I?" he demanded to no-one in particular, shivering despite his Nordic blood. Divines, he hated the cold. What he wouldn't do for a warm bottle of mead right now.

Colin was one-hundred percent positive that he was _supposed_ to be warm and lazing in his bed in Breezehome, stumbling drunk with a belly full of food and drink. Instead he was... wherever this was, cold and unpleasantly sober. Had someone _drugged_ him? It had happened before, when that Dark Brotherhood assassin had kidnapped him and demanded he murder her prisoners as "compensation". And then there was that time he'd accidentally gotten into a drinking contest with Sanguine and ended up halfway across Skyrim with a lot of angry people after his hide. Colin didn't know who or what was responsible for _this_ unwanted adventure, but they were smart not to show themselves. He probably would have killed them for this.

Knowing his luck, it was either a Divine or a Daedric Lord. But the Divines had a strict policy against interfering directly with mortal affairs whilst the Daedra (unfortunately) had no such restrictions, so it had to be one of them. Colin took a moment to review everyone he'd pissed off in the past three years.

There was a pulse at his waist, and Colin reached down and grasped the hilt of his sword, sagging with sigh of relief as Dawnbreaker sent a wave of warmth through his entire body. At least Meridia wasn't mad at him. After he was sure he wouldn't be freezing to death, he checked on the rest of his supplies. He was still wearing his leather armor, thank the Divines he'd been too drunk to take anything off. His purse of gold was still there on his belt, sixty or so septims jingling inside. His burlap knapsack was next to him, with a map, a small roasted rabbit joint, some deer jerky, a few leather straps, and most important of all some Blackbriar Honey Mead. Colin might have hated the family, but their mead was simply divine. With a cry of relief he grabbed the bottle and hugged it close before popping the cork and taking a large swig.

A pleasant warmth spread down his throat as the sweet nectar filled his belly. He burped, and with great reluctance replaced the cork. He didn't know how long it would be 'til he got his hands on another bottle, so he had to make this one last. He carefully placed everything back into his knapsack before standing and looking around. Just snow, ice, and a cold fucking wind.

He hated this place already.

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After two days of trudging through snow and ice, he was still lost.

The landscape hadn't changed at all and he still didn't recognize anything around him. Just unfamiliar mountains and lots of snow. Way too much snow. Even _Skyrim_ wasn't this bad, except for the far north, and only in winter! Where the hell was he?!

 _Fucking Daedra with their fucking boredom and their fucking "Quests"._

Grumbling murderously to himself, he leaned back against a rough black boulder that stuck out in the white landscape like a sore thumb, groaning as he took pressure off of his cold feet. If he wasn't a Nord, he would have been frozen by yesterday. If he didn't have Dawnbreaker, he wouldn't have stood a chance at all. The bitter chill that preceded frostbite was already nipping at his toes and fingers. New snow wasn't falling, thank the Divines for their small mercies, but the wind was whipping up whatever was on the ground already in a blizzard-like effect.

Shouting the wind away wasn't working, much to Colin's displeasure. The air would settle for a minute or two before another gust would drift by his face, almost mocking him, and then the winds would rise again in earnest. There was just something more... _wild_ about the skies here. And frankly, his throat was getting sore, so he had to limit his attempts to get rid of the accursed wind. Sometimes he could see for miles and miles over pristine, sparkling tundra, but more often than not he couldn't see two feet in front of his face.

He was sorely tempted to simply Whirlwind Sprint his way across this godforsaken frozen wasteland, but there was danger in using the Shout when he didn't know the landscape. Rocks hid under the snows, as did pitfalls and cliff drops. Best case scenario, he'd just trip and maybe break something. Worst case, he'd fall to his death before he had the chance to turn himself ethereal.

The cold was sapping at his strength and warmth nearly as fast as Dawnbreaker was giving it. He'd had to resort to carefully breathing fire at the ground and heating himself over cherry-red rocks, but it annoyed him that he had to do it so often. He was almost out of food and drink despite rationing it, he hadn't seen an animal this entire time, there weren't even any trees to burn, and he was still completely lost. Colin tried his best not to dwell on his misfortune, but it was really hard not to! He had to keep moving, had to find food and shelter if he wanted to survive.

The third day dragged on as Colin forged through ankle-high snow, and just before the sun disappeared over the horizon he saw it.

Smoke.

A thin, dark pillar trailing in the sky.

At this point Colin didn't care if he was walking towards friend or foe. He was walking towards _fire_ and _warmth_ and if the Divines were kind at least one bottle of mead. The sun vanished and night overtook day, but Colin didn't stop, steadily making his way towards the tiny speck of light in the distance. Dawnbreaker pulsed in his hands, as if encouraging him not to give up.

When he was about two-hundred yards away, he saw figures in the distance outlined by the small fire. They were standing up, pointing at him and waving weapons, yelling words he was too far away to hear. Colin grunted and kept moving forward despite the obvious warnings. Either they would share their fire or he would _make_ them share. After three days of wintery hell he wasn't in the mood to argue.

When he was close enough to see the people's faces, he stopped and tensed. They were all pale-skinned Nords, but they were dressed in furs with crude iron weapons, bearing neither the sigil of the Empire nor the Stormcloaks. In Skyrim, poor people— _armed_ poor people—camped out in the godforsaken wilderness usually meant one thing. Of all the rotten luck, the first fire he saw belonged to _bandits?_

 _Why, Nocturnal?! Why?!_

Had he offended her lately? He couldn't remember.

It wasn't like he couldn't take the bandits—he could, probably with both hands tied behind his back—but he was in no mood to fight. He was cold, he was hungry, he was tired, and he just wanted to eat and sleep.

As Colin walked toward them, one of the men stepped forward: a red-haired giant with a truly magnificent beard, easily a full head taller than him. Colin didn't consider himself short by any means, this man was just huge, with large beefy arms and a chest to rival even Farkas back at home. The bandit snarled and rose his axe threateningly. "Come on, then! You are not getting any closer without a fight!"

Colin stopped where he was and frowned, gripping Dawnbreaker under his cloak and relaxing as the sword sent a comforting pulse of warmth through his arm. "Friends, I am cold, hungry, and tired. I only ask to share the warmth of your fire before I freeze to death. I'm no threat to you unless you force me to be."

The bandits exchanged looks, and Colin wondered if they were planning to kill him.

"Don't trust him, Tormund!" one of the women shouted, another redhead, this time aiming a bow straight at his chest. Colin was reasonably confident he could use a Shout to get out of the way or get rid of the arrow, but he really didn't want to take that chance. "He's not one of us!"

Colin raised an eyebrow. These people were a bit too jumpy for his liking. If he let down his guard around them, they just might stab him in the back and slit his throat for good measure. No, better to stay on his toes here.

The giant man, Tormund, hesitated and then lowered his axe before calling out to the archer woman. "He's not a wight, Ygritte. But if we don't share our fire he's sure to become one."

At that the people, thirteen in all, began to lower their weapons. Except for Ygritte.

"What's a wight?" Colin asked, doing his best to ignore the crazy woman who wanted to kill him. Was it some new kind of undead? He'd seen draugr aplenty along with his fair share of reanimated corpses and enough vampires too last a lifetime, and even a few ghosts here and there, but he didn't know what wights were.

The question earned him strange looks, including a suspicious glare from Ygritte who still hadn't lowered her bow. "How do I know the he's not just trying to trick us?" she loudly demanded to Tormund.

Tormund ignored Ygritte's question and turned back to him. "Who are you, stranger? What are you doing alone in the tundra?"

Colin was about to answer when one of the women fell to her knees with a startled cry, a spear sprouting from her chest. She reached up and tried to grabbed the shaft, but she lost her strength and fell over on her side. She died with her face frozen in pain and her eyes wide open. Blood pooled around her, staining the snow a bright arterial red.

The men and women stared at their fallen comrade in shock, frozen for a few seconds before a second spear hit the ground right next to Ygritte's feet, jolting her out of her daze. "Wights!" she screamed, and everyone just ran, completely ignoring Colin (apparently deciding he was less of a threat) as they raced past him, not even bothering to explain. He stared at their rapidly vanishing forms before turning back to the campsite, where the dead woman's body was still bleeding all over the ground.

Even if he wanted to run, he couldn't. He was too tired, too cold, and weariness seeped into his very bones. If he tried, he wouldn't be fast enough, and even if he was fast enough he'd pass out from exhaustion and hunger and freeze to death shortly after. Whatever was coming, Colin had to face it head-on. Stendarr's bones, what he wouldn't do for a warm bed right now.

Gritting his teeth against a chill that seemed more sinister than normal, Colin drew Dawnbreaker and held it out in front of him, guiding his path with the sword's enchanted sunlight. On instinct he ducked, slipping out of his knapsack and allowing it to drop to the ground, and a spear whistled through the air where his head had been a second earlier. Colin turned and saw a skeleton pulling a rusty knife out of a rotting leather belt, and he charged it without hesitation. The skeleton brought its knife up to block, but Dawnbreaker didn't care. She carved through the crude iron blade like it was paper, making her way to the bone where her very touch burned and destroyed. A single swipe rendered the skeleton a smoking pile of ash with a cloven knife on top.

Colin heard screeching behind him, and he whirled around with a snarl to see... Arkay preserve him, hundreds. _Hundreds_ of the undead, just standing there. Staring at him. Some were skeletons, nothing but bones holding blades. Some had skin draped over their bones like an ill-fitting coat. Others were more freshly dead, with flesh and skin and eyes that glowed a terrible shade of blue.

Colin could feel the dragon in his soul rear up in response to the threat, seizing control and honing his senses. His exhaustion fell away, ignored or cast aside, it didn't matter. New strength rushed through his limbs. Dawnbreaker flared aggressively in his hand at the sight of so many undead, and his dragon blood sang a battle hymn in his head.

" _Tiid!_ "

His soul gripped time itself and _squeezed_ , forcing reality to submit to the blood of Akatosh. The world slowed around him. The dead were charging him, but they were about as fast as a stone dropped through water. Colin, thanks to his status as Dovahkiin, had no such disadvantage. He rushed forward, his accelerated mind registering the dead's delayed reactions as he charged with a savage roar and cut through them like wheat.

Most swords would have gotten stuck in the cold, dead flesh, maybe even cracked after hitting bone so many times, but Dawnbreaker wasn't just any sword—she was perfection, crafted by the hand of a Daedric Lord as a symbol of her power. She was the purging flame of Meridia's wrath, the light of a new day forged into a weapon unlike any other.

And with her in his hands, Colin was unstoppable, mowing through his enemy like a demon. With each slash, a walking corpse burst into flames and collapsed into piles of ash. The undead— _wights_ , the bandits had called them—tried to rush him all at once. They were faster than he expected, moving over the snow and ice like they weighed nothing, but Colin was in the midst of a Shout. He was a whirlwind, spinning out of the way of their strikes while cutting them down in the same movement. Their swords were either blocked or missed entirely. Their spears thrust into empty air or were thrown into other wights. They tried to surround him, but he wouldn't let them, relentlessly exploiting the weak spots in their formation, taking advantage of the fiery discharges Dawnbreaker expelled to ward them off.

Inevitably, the Shout wore off, and time shook away his control as it resumed its usual pace.

If he was at his best he could have easily decimated them all, but he wasn't. He was hungry, cold, and tired. Three days lost in the snowy wasteland with not enough to eat had taken their toll. He noticed it when he was too slow to entirely avoid the swipe of one of the swords, earning himself a shallow cut on his left side. He growled, then lashed out with Dawnbreaker, watching as the skeleton burned into ash before quickly moving on to the next enemy.

Further into the battle, a second wight managed to sneak up on him and stab him in the left shoulder with a rusty dagger. White-hot pain flashed through his mind, then he snarled and lopped the thing's head off. The headless body stood for a few seconds before it fell to its knees and keeled over, burning all the while from Dawnbreaker's enchanted fire.

Colin swayed on his feet, clutching the dagger still buried in his left shoulder, but he didn't pull it out. He didn't have the time to cast a healing spell on himself, and if he took it out while he was still fighting he'd bleed out in less than a minute. He'd have to wait until he got away.

Then he felt it—the deep cold.

He'd heard legends about such a thing, the kind of cold that killed off all life and had forced the ancestors of the Nords away from the frozen shores of Atmora. It chilled him to the bone, ignoring even the warmth of Dawnbreaker and drew from him a pained cry. His movements slowed and for a brief moment he feared that the undead would take advantage, but as he spun around he saw that they were giving him a wide berth, surrounding him but carefully not coming in range. There were less than half of them now, the others mere ash against the snow. But Colin didn't let his guard down and stood at the ready, Dawnbreaker raised in silent aggression, cleansing light pulsating from her guard.

The ranks of the corpses parted, and out stepped... Colin didn't know what it was. It was tall and pale, with defined noble features and long white hair, and the same terrible shade of blue eyes that he'd seen in some of the fresher corpses. It was unclothed save for a loincloth, and in its hand it carried a blade that looked like it had been carved from some special glowing ice. It raised its sword at him, opened its mouth, and screeched, and Colin thought his ears would burst from the awful noise. It slithered around his ears—cracking ice, shifting glaciers, and the howl of a frozen wind all at once.

For a fleeting moment, he was frightened.

And the dragon deep within him was enraged at the thought.

Like the memory of a dream, the wisdom of Paarthurnax echoed in the corners of his mind.

 _It is change given form, power at its most primal._

Colin inhaled deeply, tasting the cold wintery air.

 _What will you spare?_

If he'd been looking at himself, he would have seen the back of his throat glow a bright cherry red.

 _What will you burn?_

" _Yol!_ "

His Thu'um erupted from his maw in a brilliant stream of power, and his world was swallowed by dragonflame. The crackling of fire and screams of the dead filled his ears, and the heat of the Shout warmed his body even as it devastated everything it touched.

When the Shout had run its course, everything was shrouded with steam and smoke. Stray winds cleared the air, and Colin saw the ground was smoking and charred, and the rocky surface that had been buried beneath the snow was uncovered and glowing bright red with heat. The blue-eyed ice demon stood there alone, staring at him with an open mouth and wide eyes. For a hundred yards behind it, the wights had been reduced to nothing but ash that was quickly being blown away.

Colin couldn't help but be impressed that this monster had managed to withstand the flames, but he could see steam rising from little cracks in its skin, almost like boiling water trapped inside ice. The monster looked down and touched one of the cracks in horrified fascination. It was _dying_ , Colin realized. Then the thing fixed him with a gaze of pure hatred, wailed, and _shattered,_ breaking down in a pile of melting and boiling ice shards until nothing remained.

The action reminded him of Ice Wraiths, although the Wraiths just melted when they were killed. Did this mean it was dead? Probably, even if he'd never seen it happen before.

Colin was so distracted by the sight that he almost didn't hear the whistling of a sword. He darted forward with a strangled yelp, barely avoiding the ice blade of the second monster that had snuck up behind him. He whirled around and it screeched at him, and Colin wanted to cover his ears as fear crept up his throat. He'd killed one of them already, but there was something plain _unnerving_ about these things.

Then it charged with an astonishing speed that rivaled even Master Vampires, and Colin barely managed to block with Dawnbreaker, his injured shoulder screaming with protest at the motion. Their blades chimed like bells as they clashed, and the _thing_ screeched again before shoving him away with unholy strength and raising its sword high above its head. Colin rolled out of the way of the first strike, the brought his sword up to block the second, and he couldn't help but hiss. Just being _near_ it was like fighting someone with a Frost Cloak, except it was worse. The cold was sapping at his strength, numbing his limbs and making it hard to move.

Their blades clashed again and again, fire against ice, neither gaining the upper hand. They were caught in a deadlock, both refusing to give ground, and Colin saw it up close. If there had been a fusion of sorts with a draugr and dremora, created with power over ice and snow, this was probably what they would have looked like. But this was no simple dremora, and it certainly wasn't a draugr. This felt more sinister than either, the battle hymn in his blood far more urgent.

Snarling, Colin allowed heat to build up in the back of his throat before unleashing it in an explosive Shout.

" _Yol!_ "

To Colin's horror, he _missed_ , and his dragonfire sailed out into the crowd of undead instead of the creature he was facing. The monster had apparently realized what he was doing and jumped out of the way at the last possible second. It faced him with a screech and advanced, light and limber on the snow. Colin could instantly tell that this one was a lot more cautious than the last one had been.

 _Fucking cold, fucking necromantic ice demons, fuck fuck fuck—_

Dawnbreaker flared without warning and the monster recoiled, shielding its eyes with an ear-splitting screech.

 _I love you, Meridia!_

Colin ducked under the creature's blind swing and lunged, stabbing it through the chest. When it screamed, its features distorted with pain, Colin could feel something warm and wet dribbling out of his ears. Such a tortured sound, as if its very soul was burning. Knowing Meridia's religious hatred of the undead, it probably was.

He watched the light in its eyes slowly fade. And then it exploded, much like most undead unfortunate enough to have a taste of Dawnbreaker, but the scale was far larger than usual. From the center of the monster's chest where Dawnbreaker was still buried rose a fire, blue and yellow and full of vengeance. It erupted from the creature's body, tearing it apart in the process, completely ignoring Colin as it spread out in a ripple of pure destruction. As it passed over him, he felt warm and safe, like he was back home in Whiterun in the Bannered Mare, sitting with his friends and drinking himself stupid.

 _Well done, my Champion,_ he heard Meridia whisper in his mind. There was no mistaking her voice, womanly and dripping with power.

The wave of cleansing flames went past him and rushed out over the land, burning through the ranks of the dead, leaving none but the living unscathed. In an instant it was over, and Colin was surrounded by a field of ash and abandoned weapons. He looked around, and when he saw nothing else in the snow, he swayed on his feet and collapsed bonelessly, darkness clouding his vision.


	2. Ygritte

**Summary:** Colin didn't know who he pissed off, but he woke up cold and hungry in the middle of a snowy wasteland. Being the Dragonborn really sucked sometimes. [A Dragonborn appears Beyond the Wall story.]

 **Author's Note:** A huge thank-you to _Igornerd_ and _To Mockingbird_ for going through and helping me edit this chapter.

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Chapter 2

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 **Ygritte**

The Others were back.

No-one wanted to believe it at first, but old stories were hard to ignore when entire villages disappeared and the dead rose again with bright blue eyes and a hatred for the living.

It started with just a few at first, some of the Hornfoots in the outer fringes of the Frostfangs—a people whose feet were so blackened and hardened by the cold that they didn't even need boots. One day a few went out hunting in their mountains and didn't come back. More were sent out to look for them, and they didn't come back either. Then small villages disappeared, and no one knew about it until the usual traders never showed.

The men of the Frozen Shore were next, where the snows were so deep that they rode chariots of walrus bones pulled by packs of dogs. Hunting groups were sent out to find a walrus or two, any animal large enough to feed them, really. And then they'd just vanish. No one knew where they went or what happened to them.

Not long after that, the Hornfoots nearly lost their entire tribe, set upon by a sea walking corpses with bright blue eyes, hunted relentlessly by armies of the dead... and the ones that led them, forever cloaked in blizzards and a deathly chill. The Others, monsters straight out legend with terrible magic and swords of the coldest ice. The other tribes were attacked shortly after, and in their greatest time of need rose Mance Raider, a former Crow turned King-Beyond-The-Wall.

Mance was the only one who could lead the Free Folk, the only one who could force the clans to put aside their differences in the face of their ancient enemy, making a name for himself with new alliances and long-lost relics like the legendary Horn of Winter he'd found in ancient barrows. He alone forged them into the greatest army the True North had ever seen. Old rivalries were cast aside for the sake of survival, and former enemies grudgingly accepted each other as allies, even if only temporarily. All except for the Thenns who greedily clung to their lands by order of their Magnar, a man who ruled them like a god.

Ygritte would be the first to admit that not everyone was happy about pursuing an alliance with the Thenns, but Mance couldn't afford to ignore them. Even if the Thenns were dumb as rocks and sadistic fucks who most Free Folk wouldn't mind seeing dead (Ygritte included), none could deny that they were good at killing. And Mance _needed_ men like that if he wanted to prevail, especially because of the Thenns' close connection with the last remaining giant clans. So while he handled organizing the army he sent Ygritte, Tormund, and a few others from every clan as representatives to the Thenn to try to convince them to join the army, and if that failed, to issue Mance's challenge of single combat to the Magnar in a manner that could not be ignored.

Hopefully they wouldn't die after delivering the message. The Magnar wasn't known for his patience or his control over his anger, and Ygritte didn't think she could fight off an entire tribe of angry madmen.

And so as Mance's main force gathered in a valley near the Fist of the First Men, Ygritte's group traveled north under Tormund's command, forever keeping an eye out for shadowcats, wights, or worse. Then halfway there at the edge of the mountains of the Frostfangs after they'd hunkered down for the night, a dark-haired stranger stumbled out of the night and into the yellow light of their fire. He had a woolen cloak wrapped tightly around him, though Ygritte doubted it did much to keep the cold out. Whoever he was, he was no Crow. Even _they_ were smart enough to get furs to keep warm, though almost always black as their name.

He was shivering as he approached them, tripping over himself as he walked, but everyone was pointing their weapons at him nonetheless. No matter how harmless he seemed, it could all be some vile trick. Maybe a distraction while his hidden friends snuck around to stab them in the back. Ygritte scowled and scanned the surrounding area. Nothing but snow and rocks, and shadows dancing in the light of their fire.

The man stopped a mere thirty feet away, staring at them. From this distance Ygritte could put an arrow in his eye and then another one in his other eye before his body even realized it was dead. She'd done it before, enough to be confident that she could do it again at the first sign of trouble. It was too dark to see his eyes clearly, but at least they weren't glowing blue. Still, she put more tension into her bowstring just in case. She didn't see him carrying any weapons, but he could have hidden something under that cloak of his.

As she got a closer look, Ygritte saw that he was pale, but it was the kind of pale that could only be seen among the Cave People who lived all their lives in the dark: a frail, sickly white. The rest of his body told a different story, though. He had long black hair that framed sharp, angular features that seemed more at home on the face of a southron Crow. It was nigh impossible among Cave People who all had faces like they'd been smashed in with a stone and a wit to match, which was what tended to happen when men fucked their sisters and mothers for generation after generation.

Where Cave People were squat and deformed and were more stupid than they looked, the stranger was tall and well-proportioned, though not as tall as Tormund. Then again, no-one was as tall as Tormund. And Ygritte could have just imagined it, but she swore the stranger's eyes glimmered with fierce intelligence. More than the Cave People, anyway.

Then he spoke, asking if he could share their fire, and it was immediately clear that he looked tired and hungry because he _was_. That raggedness in his voice wasn't something that could be easily faked, not among a people who experienced it regularly in their way of life. He was clearly freezing or starving to death—maybe both, _probably_ both—but Ygritte still didn't trust him, and thankfully no-one else did, either. Their mission was too important to be ruined by some stranger, especially one with such a strange accent. He didn't quite talk like a kneeler, but Ygritte didn't recognize the accent from any of the tribes of the Free Folk, either. It was a strange mix of the unrefined dialect of her people tempered with an odd southron cadence she'd only heard from Crows. She didn't know what to make of it. Maybe he was a so-called Northman?

She voiced her suspicions, scowling when Tormund ordered her to stand down with a clear reminder that they had enough wights to fight already. Everyone stared when the stranger asked what a wight was. Ygritte very deliberately raised an eyebrow. Was he playing at being stupid or was he genuinely dim-witted? Maybe he really _was_ one of the Cave People, or at least had a mother unlucky enough to have been fucked by one. Just as she was about to shoot him through the eye despite what Tormund said, she heard a wet thump and a startled cry. She quickly turned and saw Fregga, one of the spearwives of the Ice River Clan, fall to her knees with a spear sprouting from her chest.

Ygritte could dimly hear the stranger screaming something, but she wasn't paying attention to him. Fregga reached up and pulled the spear out, but she was losing her strength. She was done for. Ygritte could see it in the way the light was leaving her eyes. Everyone stared as their comrade fell on her side, her face frozen in a mask of pain and fear. Then another spear came from the darkness, this time hitting the ground right in front of Ygritte's feet. She snapped her head up with a snarl, half-thinking that the bastard of a stranger had tricked them into letting their guard down.

A chill crept up her spine.

In the darkness she saw glowing blue eyes. Hundreds and hundreds of them. Far too many to hope to survive.

This time, a _real_ chill was beginning to set in. The air was steadily robbing her of her warmth, and the wind began to howl as snow was lifted from the ground and swirled all around them.

By the Old Gods, they had to get the hell out of here.

"Wights!" she screamed before taking off in the opposite direction as fast as her legs would carry her, feeling absolutely no shame in leaving the stranger to die. She didn't have to look to know that the rest of her group was following her.

They ran blindly into the darkness, desperately scrambling back to their feet when they stumbled. Whoever slowed down would be the first to die, and none of them wanted to rise again with those awful blue eyes.

They ran in the wrong direction.

They nearly smashed into a group of twenty wights that had been shambling towards their abandoned campsite. The wights took one look at them before they lunged with blood-curdling screeches. Ygritte cursed and threw her bow to the side, drawing a sword she'd taken from a dead Crow. She was the best archer among them, but arrows were worse than useless against wights. They had to be hacked apart or burned. Anything less was barely a distraction.

One of the wights ran at her with an axe raised above its rotting head, eyes aglow with the magic of the Others. Ygritte threw herself out of the way of the first attack, and before the wight could recover, she sliced through its wrist, and the weapon fell along with the hand that was holding it. The wight didn't even notice, and it launched at her with a rasp that she was sure she'd hear in her nightmares. Ygritte cursed again and desperately backpedaled, trying to keep distance, but the wight wasn't having any of it. It advanced relentlessly, reaching for her with rotting fingers and snapping jaws.

Just when she was sure it would catch her, Tormund appeared out of nowhere and split it right down the middle from its head to its groin with a monstrous swing of his axe. The corpse stood there for a few seconds before the light vanished from its eyes, and its new halves fell in different directions.

Her heart pounding after her brush with death, Ygritte looked up and saw Tormund stretching out his hand. Behind him were the hacked-apart remains of three more wights, the limbs still twitching with whatever sorcery that made them move.

Around them, the fights weren't going well, all because wights didn't fight like people fought. They felt no fear, no pain, had no sense of self-preservation. They came after the living like killing was the only thing in the world that mattered. And in this fight, there were more of the dead than the living.

After he hauled her to her feet, Tormund immediately rushed back into the fray to help, but it was plain to Ygritte that they were losing the battle. Three of their number were already on the ground with holes in their chest and their throats ripped out, and the others were soon to follow. Ygritte snarled to herself before moving to follow Tormund. If she didn't fight, she would die—that much was certain. Trying to outrun wights in the open at night was the stupidest thing they could do.

She snuck up behind a half-rotted wight that was engaged with a man from the Hornfoots, one of the few that had escaped the massacre of his clan. With a yell she swung her sword and lopped its head off before kicking the body in the back and quickly hacking at its legs before it could get up.

That was the annoying thing about wights—they couldn't even behead them and be done with it. They'd _still_ come at the living and try to rip their faces off, even severed limbs clawing after them as they tried to get away.

Then they heard it: the explosions. When they could they snuck glances back to their abandoned campsite, and through the swirling snow and the shroud of night's darkness, they saw interspaced flashes of blue and yellow light. Was the light from the Others?

Panic threatened to stop her heart even as it raced out of control. Ygritte didn't remember hearing any stories about anything like this, but so much had been forgotten already. Who was to say this wasn't one of their signs?

Without warning, night turned to day as _massive_ torrent of flames lit up the darkness, easily visible through the blizzard-like winds. In its light Ygritte saw dozens of wights roast, burning to ash in mere seconds, white-hot weapons of stone and metal falling from charred, crumbling fingers onto rapidly melting snow. And briefly, she thought she saw one of _them_. It was in the middle of the sudden inferno, and the near-blinding light obscured its features, but an ancient instinct slumbering in her blood screamed a warning all the same.

Then as quickly as they'd appeared, the flames vanished, and darkness returned. Despite the situation, everyone couldn't help but stare for a few seconds, jaws dropped in awe and fear. The wights had no such awe, slashing the throat of a man who had been too distracted. He stood there, clawing at his throat as he choked on his own blood before the wights dragged the poor bastard to the ground, stabbing him over and over.

This spurred everyone into action, and the survivors once again devoted their full attention to their undead enemies. But the wights were relentless, and the Free Folk were tired. The battle was slowly and surely turning towards the worst.

The inferno appeared again, spewing its flames in a different direction this time before quickly dying away. Out of the darkness shambled another twenty wights like they'd been signaled by the fire, moving in to attack from behind, and Ygritte felt a wave of frustrated anger momentarily freeze her in place. Had her group ever stood a chance? Were they simply meant to die here no matter how hard they fought?

Before she could scream her rage, she saw something. From where they'd seen the flames, the yellow-blue lights appeared again, expanding to the limit until they _burst_. Ygritte and her companions cried out as a wave of ghostly fire washed over them but somehow didn't touch them, lighting only the wights which quickly burst into flames and were consumed.

For a few wonderful seconds it felt like the warmth of spring had returned.

Almost instantly, the warm sensation was gone along with the ghostly fire, and they were alone amidst smoking piles of ash. None of the dead had escaped. Even the severed limbs had been burned to a crisp.

Silence reigned.

"Magmar's moldy balls, what _was_ that?!" one of the men exclaimed, louder than was wise. Ygritte recognized him, a squat man with a pug nose and crooked teeth, but she hadn't liked him enough to make an effort in learning his name. He was too much of a cunt for her liking.

"Keep your mouth shut!" Ygritte automatically snapped back.

"What? It's not like they can hear us!" Sigfreid, as Ygritte remembered he was called, protested. "They ain't following us no more. They's all burned by now."

Something about his lack of caution was plain _offensive_ to Ygritte.

"And how do _you_ know that, snotnose?" she snarled.

The man turned red and clenched his jaw, but he didn't say anything else.

 _How is this brainless idiot not dead by now?_

Ygritte shook her head with a huff and looked back to where the ghostly fire had come from. All of a sudden, the winds died down, the air cleared, and she saw him. The stranger stood alone, a sword in his hand that looked like it was forged with light. At least, it had to be the stranger because she'd never heard of a wight with a glowing sword, and the Others had swords of ice, not fire. For a moment Ygritte swore that there was a tiny sun shining in the sword's guard. Out of the corner of her eyes she could see the others in her group staring as well, jaws slackened at the sight of that beautiful blade.

Without warning, the stranger unceremoniously collapsed, disappearing from sight as the sword of light also vanished from view.

Everyone stared at each other, unsure of what to do.

Eventually Tormund huffed, shaking them from their silence. "Let's go," he ordered. "We need to find out who he is."

Ygritte agreed. She wanted a closer look at that sword.

They made their way back to their abandoned campsite, suspiciously eyeing the hundreds of piles of ash that now surrounded them as far as the eye could see. Ygritte half-wondered if the wights were somehow hiding in the ash. She steeled her nerves and tested her theory, using her sword to poke through one of the piles. Just ash, and a rusty old axe. Tormund saw what she was doing and followed suit, kicking at the pile nearest to his feet. His yielded a chipped dagger and some rotting furs.

They all paused when Sigfreid reached into a pile to grab something. He stood up, holding a shiny gold armband with a stupid grin on his face.

"What?" he said defensively when he noticed their looks of disgust and contempt. "Not like he's gonna need it much now."

Ygritte just shook her head, not even bothering to answer.

 _Fucking idiot. Only an inbred half-wit would give a damn about jewelry at a time like this._

Sigfreid's stupidity aside, they cautiously made their way back to camp where they found the stranger flat on his face, surrounded by piles of ash with the glowing sword still in his hand. Two pale swords lay on the ground close to him. Swords of _ice_.

A chill that had nothing to do with the cold crept up Ygritte's spine, and the terrifying image of the monster she'd seen in the inferno rose again in her mind.

 _Fucking Crows, he actually killed Others._

Everyone simply stood there, dumbstruck by evidence they could barely process.

"Is that—"

Ygritte turned and nearly had a heart attack at what she saw.

"Don't _touch_ that, you shite-brained halfwit! Do you _want_ your hand to fall off?!"

Gunther, a lanky yellow-haired man from the Ice River Tribes, withdrew his hand with a scowl, glaring daggers at her for the insult, and Ygritte almost immediately regretted saving his life.

 _What an ungrateful cunt._

After the initial shock had worn off, they dragged the stranger to the snuffed-out fire which they rekindled and began nursing him back to health while they burned their fallen comrades. When they had everything ready, they quickly removed the dagger from his shoulder, removed his leather armor as much as they needed to, and pressed on his wound until the bleeding stopped, after which they wrapped him in the cleanest furs they could find. It would have been better if they'd had something to boil water in, or even just cloth, but they worked with what they had.

But then there was the matter of the stranger's sword. It was forged from a strange, gold-colored metal. Straight and arm-length, it was a far cry from the so-called 'knightly' swords that the kneeling southrons seemed to prefer. Nonetheless, it was flawless to their eyes—a thing of deadly beauty with a tiny sun shining from its guard. That was the detail that shocked everyone the most. A sun, a _sun_ , stuck in the guard of a sword, emitting real light and heat that melted the snow where it had fallen. Even the legends of the Children had never spoken of such a thing!

 _Such powerful magic,_ Ygritte thought, gazing at the weapon with reverence. _Where did it come from? Why now?_

Some of the men got into a fight over who'd get to keep it, but the moment one of them tried to touch the blade it _burned_ them, flaring with sun-laced fire, every bit as fiercely hot as the real thing. They had to wrap the stranger's hand around it to move it at all.

Ygritte couldn't help but notice how no-one took their eyes off the ice swords, warily keeping their distance. Not everyone was so smart, however. At one point, Sigfreid had paused above the swords with his foot reared back, and Ygritte realized with exasperated disbelief that he was actually about to _kick_ them. She briefly considered yelling at him to leave the evil things alone, but then it occurred to her that if he died she wouldn't have to deal with him anymore.

She was disappointed, though. Right when he was about to go through with it, Tormund saw and roared at him to quit being a brainless idiot. Sigfreid jumped in fright and then scurried away from the sword, leaving Ygritte glowering and unsatisfied.

That wasn't the last act of stupidity, though.

"We should kill him."

Ygritte looked up, her face already twisting with confusion. "What?"

It wasn't Sigfreid like she expected, but someone else. A strong woman named Ullte who, while a reasonably good spearwife, was insufferable on all accounts. Probably because she'd had the pox as a child and it had scarred her face, turning her bitter as man after man rejected her for better-looking women.

Ullte stood, using her axe to gesture towards where the stranger had been set up by the fire. "We should kill 'im," she repeated, as though it were a completely sound proposal. "He's too dangerous. And he has magic." Here she allowed her face to twist with distaste, making her look even uglier than usual.

Ygritte stared. "The only man in eight-thousand years since the last Long Night to kill an Other, the only man _ever_ to somehow defeat that many wights on his own, and you want to _kill 'im?_ "

Ullte hesitated at her sudden venom but still had the audacity to nod. "He's too dangerous. He might turn on us with his powers. We should just take his shiny sword an' use it for ourselves. Then _we_ could kill the wights and the Others, too."

"You can't even _use_ the sword! It won't let any of us hold it!" said Siggy, the last surviving woman of their group. Ygritte was mildly surprised to find that she wasn't the only voice of reason.

"It's not natural! _He's_ not natural! What if he's a warlock like the Night King used to be?"

Ygritte scowled. Ullte was playing on common fears of sorcery and betrayal, using old legends to bolster her claim. It was a dirty tactic, all the more effective now that wights and worse roamed the land. "Warg's ain't 'natural', but we still use 'em for the good of the Free Folk."

Ullte raised her axe just enough not to be outright hostile but enough for people to be wary of her all the same. "I still say we kill him," she snarled.

Ygritte was mere moments away from just putting an arrow through her brain when Tormund growled deep and low like a bear, instantly capturing everyone's attention. He was laying down, stretched out on the ground but no less intimidating for it. "No. We are _no'_ killin' this man. We take 'im to Mance. If you have a problem with that I'll kill you right here, right now."

Ullte stood there for a moment, her pox-scarred face paling before she quickly sat down and started muttering to herself. Tormund just snorted and rolled over, silent for the rest of the night.

With the tension more or less gone, the others went back to resting by their rekindled fire. Ygritte found herself staring at the stranger, her eyes tracing over his sharp features, slackened in exhaustion.

 _Who are you?_

Her eyes drifted to the sword still in his hand, and she swore the blade shone a bit brighter, like it was talking to her. She gazed at it with open wonder, basking in the magical light, feeling its warmth soak into her skin and banish the cold from her flesh.

In her mind's eye she saw the inferno that had roasted the wights mere hours ago, rendering them naught but ash in the wind.

 _What are you?_


	3. Colin Stormcrown II

**Summary:** Colin didn't know who he pissed off, but he woke up cold and hungry in the middle of a snowy wasteland. Being the Dragonborn really sucked sometimes. [A Dragonborn appears Beyond the Wall story.]

 **Author's Note:** Another huge thank-you to _Igornerd_ and _To Mockingbird_ for going through and helping me edit this chapter.

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Chapter 3

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 **Colin Stormcrown**

Darkness pressed down all around him. He couldn't see, hear, or even feel. He was lost with only his thoughts for company, denied the bliss of true unconsciousness. He wondered how long it would be before he went mad. He wondered if he was already mad and just didn't know it yet. After all, he didn't even know how long he'd been drifting.

Just as his mind conjured the thought, he heard a man's voice all around him, light and carefree with a familiar tinge of insanity.

 _I am a shadow in your subconscious, a blemish on your fragile little psyche. You know me. You just don't know it. Sheogorath, Daedric Prince of Madness, at your service!_

From the depths of the darkness an orb of light appeared, bright pink and bubbly with glowing tendrils swaying to an unfelt wind.

 _Oh, great,_ Colin thought, vicious sarcasm lacing the words. _Just what I needed._

Sheogorath laughed, the biting edge to his tone making Colin fear the Prince's usual games were about to take a darker turn. He couldn't help but be reminded of the various ways he'd been forced put his life at risk in the mad quest for the Wabbajack—an artifact that Colin hadn't even _wanted_ and had done his damnedest to get rid of at the first opportunity.

 _Lighten up, Dragonborn!_ Sheogorath scolded, thankfully sounding more amused than angered. _Don't be such a party pooper! Even poor old_ Pelagius _was more fun than you, and he lost his hip bone! Or was that dear Martin? I can never remember._

Oddly enough, as soon as the subject shifted to Martin (whom Colin could only assume was _Martin_ _Septim_ , holy shit) Sheogorath's voice became distinctly womanly. Normally this wouldn't have been that surprising. After all, the Princes were above the many shackles of mortality, gender included, although there were certain aspects that each Prince seemed to favor.

However, Sheogorath wasn't always a Prince—once she'd been a mortal woman. A great woman, a heroic woman, but mortal nonetheless. With a start, Colin realized that he might be talking to the Hero of Kvatch, who alongside Martin Septim had saved Tamriel from Mehrunes Dagon and put an end to the Oblivion Crisis. That didn't make her any less dangerous, unfortunately. Immortality had taken a heavy toll on her mind.

 _What do you want, Sheogorath?_ he asked, doing his best to sound as disinterested and boring as possible. Maybe if the Prince lost interest he'd be left alone.

He could practically _hear_ the Daedric Lord's mocking grin. _Oh, nothing much._ _Just checking in on the favorite plaything of the Divines and the Princes. Poor old Akatosh. He makes the shiniest toys but never gets to keep them for himself._

That was the unfortunate truth of it. Colin was doomed to constant interference from both Divine and Daedra. He was apparently the go-to guy for getting things done on the mortal plane, everything from rescuing Dibella's soon-to-be sybil from some crazy Forsworn to retrieving Azura's Star from a power-hungry (and annoyingly skilled) mage.

 _So ungrateful, Dragonborn,_ Sheogorath scolded, in doing so revealing that she/he/it had been eavesdropping on Colin's thoughts. _Why_ , _I even served you tea! East Empire Company, too! You were never this rude to dear old Kodlak, were you? Oh wait! You were!_

Colin's mind froze at the words, and a simmering rage took hold of him.

 _Careful, Sheogorath,_ he all but snarled, his earlier caution completely tossed aside.

The Prince blithely ignored the warning. _He had such high hopes for you, that old man. So patient and understanding. And you repaid him by abandoning him to his fate! Marvelous! The madness that fell upon him in his last moments was truly a sight to behold!_

 _SHUT UP!_ Colin roared. _Don't taint his memory with your mockery!_

 _Ooh, did I hit a nerve?_ Sheogorath gleefully asked. _And why would I need to taint his memory when you've done such a good job of it?_ The Prince cackled with mad delight at her barb, and that moment Colin wanted nothing more than to find a way to rip her to shreds, to make her burn and _suffer_. But he couldn't move, he couldn't Shout. For all intents and purposes he was as helpless as a child, and that made his impotent rage burn even hotter than before.

And then another voice cut through the mad god's rambling—a woman's, strong and clear like the chime of a silver bell.

 _Begone, Sheogorath! You shall not harass my Champion any longer!_

Where Sheogorath's light had been pink and bubbly, a new light formed—pure white, and near-blinding in its intensity. It shaped itself into the featureless silhouette of a robed woman which proceeded to bodily place itself between Colin and Sheogorath's light.

If he could have felt his body, Colin would have sagged with relief.

 _Oh, come on!_ Sheogorath protested. _I was only having a bit of fun! The Dragonborn's been so_ dour _lately. I'm doing him a service, free of charge!_

 _Have your "fun" elsewhere, Sheogorath. Leave us!_

Meridia's silhouette raised its hand in obvious threat, and an ominous humming steadily built up around them. Sheogorath's light finally showed some form of apprehension as it recoiled.

 _Fine, but I'll be back! Watch for me, Dragonborn. Look forward to the many joys of madness! Ta-ta!_

Sheogorath's light vanished, and Colin was left alone with a far more prickly but arguably less dangerous (at least to the living) Prince.

 _Wretched fool_ , Meridia growled. _His own followers are completely useless, so he toys with everyone else's!_

 _My Lady?_ Colin cautiously ventured. Was she going to send him back to his body? He could never tell with the Princes. Even the more predictable ones like Meridia had surprised him on more than one occasion.

Meridia's silhouette turned to him, her head tilting as she appraised him. Conrad somehow managed to shiver despite not actually having a body at the moment when he saw her pupil-less eyes looking him over. It was like staring at a living statue.

Meridia nodded sharply, apparently finished with her unnerving inspection. _You_ , _my Champion, have work to do. Awaken, and let this world know my light!_

 _My Lady, what are you—_

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Colin immediately regretted waking up. His shoulder was on fire, throbbing mightily in tandem with his breathing. Every little motion sending lances of pain all across his torso and down his arm. He groaned and opened his eyes, only to find himself surrounded by unfamiliar faces. There were eight people wrapped in heavy furs, five men and three woman, all of them staring at him. After a moment of incomprehension, Colin recognized them as the bandits he'd seen earlier.

And here he was, injured and at their mercy. Sure, he could Shout them all to bits if he really had to, but all it took was one lucky shot, a single arrow or a knife to the heart or head, and he'd be a goner. He felt his heart sink to his stomach when he saw Dawnbreaker propped up against a stone _behind_ two of the bandits, well out of his reach.

 _Nocturnal, can we talk about this? Can I do some sort of quest for you to get off your shit-list?_

Silence, almost mocking in its nature. He bit back a groan.

 _Oh, sure. Ignore the Dragonborn when it's convenient,_ Colin grumbled murderously in his head.

"Told you he was waking up," a red-haired woman said to the others. "Saw him moving and groaning like he was having himself a nightmare." Colin dimly recognized her as the same one who'd been pointing an arrow at his face before the army of undead and those ice demons came rushing at them.

 _Ysolda? Ygrassa? I know her name was Y-something..._

Now that he got a closer look at her, he was briefly reminded of Aela by the proud way she carried herself and by the fire in her hair.

That was where the similarities ended.

Aela's voice was strong and clear, and this woman's was raspy and hoarse. Aela was much taller, her muscles perfectly toned from a lifetime of hunting and fighting. The woman in front of him, on the other hand, was merely average in height. While she didn't seem soft by any means (here, Colin recalled how eager she'd been to shoot him in the face), she also didn't radiate the dominant Alpha strength that Aela seemed to possess.

"What do you want?" Colin demanded, his tone far more confident than the situation deserved.

"Oy, stranger," sneered a much less attractive brown-haired woman, her face hideously scarred by what had to have been pox or something like it. "We're the ones who saved your worthless hide. _We're_ the ones asking questions. Tell us what you did back there," the woman ordered, somehow managing to sound both hostile and contemptuous in a way that could have put even Elenwen to shame.

Colin felt his eyes narrow. He did _not_ like being ordered around. He was a Nord, and Nords didn't give respect or obedience where it hadn't been earned. More than that, he was the Dragonborn. If anything people obeyed _him_ , not the other way around.

"Maybe I'll tell someone _prettier_ ," he sneered right back, putting emphasis on the word to add the extra edge to the insult. He was immediately forced to fight off a wince as his shoulder sent a reproaching lance of pain down his arm at the movement, but he kept the discomfort off his face. He wouldn't be the first to show weakness here.

The woman, as expected, turned red with rage as everyone around her guffawed at the insult. She looked mere seconds away from trying to rip his throat out with her teeth when a large hand clamped itself firmly on her shoulder. Colin's gaze followed the arm up to the face of the red-haired giant man who he assumed was the leader of the bandits. Tormund, he recalled the man was called.

"Back away, Ullte," Tormund growled, staring her down with a stern expression. "I won't let you kill him."

Ullte glared up at the giant before roughly pulling herself away and moodily stomping across to sit on the other side of the fire. Colin watched her go. He wasn't sorry for what he'd said. If she wanted to be a prick, he'd be a prick right back. Then he frowned as he noticed something strange about the fire, or more specifically, what was actually burning in the fire. It definitely wasn't wood.

"Is that... shit?" he asked. Next to the fire was a respectably-sized mound of what was unmistakably feces. Colin recognized most of it as belonging to elk or reindeer, but he felt a bit queasy when he saw the occasional human variety interspaced here and there. The cold air seemed to be dampening the smell, which was probably why Colin hadn't noticed right away what the fuel was. Thank the Divines for their small mercies.

Tormund followed Colin's gaze to the fire behind him before turning back with a resigned grunt. "Aye, any shit we could find. Far too little out here."

"No man should have to live anywhere you have to burn shit to keep warm," Colin bitterly complained.

Tormund stared at him for a moment before snorting, and slowly, the other bandits around him relaxed a little. "You have the truth of it, stranger. We live close to our land, but she is a cruel wife. Fail to obey her and she kills you."

Colin tried to laugh, but he ended up gritting his teeth at the spikes of pain radiating from his shoulder. If his recent streak of luck was any indication, the wound was probably infected. He made a note to try to get off of Nocturnal's shit-list in the immediate future. "Perhaps you could tell me where I am?" he managed through his pain. "I'm a bit lost."

Tormund stared for a moment. "That depends. Who are you? And where do you _think_ you are?"

"Colin," he answered, raising an eyebrow at the odd question. Why would it matter where he thought he was? "If I knew where I was I wouldn't be asking."

The bandits looked at one another before the red-haired woman who reminded him of Aela answered. "You're north of the Wall, southron. A bit far from home, ain't you?"

Colin frowned. The Wall? The way she said it made it sound like some important landmark. In any case, he'd never heard of it. Unless she was referring to Alduin's Wall which was an _extremely_ well-kept secret. "And what in Oblivion is the Wall supposed to be?"

The bandits all laughed. "Is he playing at being daft?" one of the men snorted.

"Mayhaps he's not playing at all!"

That set off another round of laughter. Colin bristled but managed to reign in his anger. There was a time and place to strike out against insults, and this was not it. Not when he was injured and surrounded with his weapon out of reach. And more importantly, not when simply killing them all wasn't the wisest choice. After all, he was still hopelessly lost and his stomach uncomfortably empty.

"No, really, where am I?" he asked, his face a careful mask of calm. "How far away am I from Whiterun?"

At this the bandits frowned and looked at one another, repeating the name in apparent confusion. "None of us have ever heard that name, southron," Tormund eventually answered. "We have no reason to learn of the lands south of the Wall, save for the so-called 'North'."

Several of the bandits swore and spit off to their sides at the mention of the 'North'.

 _Southron? What in Oblivion is that supposed to mean? And what's so damn important about a bloody Wall?_

"Well, I've never heard of this Wall of yours," Colin snapped, letting his frustration get the better of him. "Either one of us is lying or—"

"Careful who you call a liar, southron," Tormund warned, his voice hard and his eyes flinty. All around him the bandits were beginning to tense dangerously. "We don't take kindly to such insults, especially not from strangers who claim not to even know what the _Wall_ is."

Colin glared, his rage building like a furnace. They were mere bandits, and he was the Dragonborn. He could wipe them out with a _word_ , weaponless or no. Why should they be allowed to insult him? Why shouldn't he just force them to kneel and show proper _respect?_ Why shouldn't he just _kill them all_ and—

 _Drem. Peace. We come into this world a warlike and destructive race, but we do not have to remain as such._

Paarthurnax's words cut through his thoughts like a breath of fresh air, gently dispelling the haze of aggression that clouded his mind. Colin took a deep breath and forced himself to let his anger go. He closed his eyes, and the dragon within him poised to strike with fire and death reluctantly backed down.

 _What is better—to be born good, or to overcome your evil nature through great effort?_

Colin huffed through his nose, forcing the last vestiges of his aggression far below the surface. Inner peace, inner calm. _Drem_. He opened his eyes and found Tormund staring back at him. "Well?" Colin asked, feeling a bit empty now that his anger was gone. "Do I get to learn your names?"

He already knew Tormund's name and Ullte's name, but that was by accident. Besides, it was common courtesy to introduce themselves, and Colin felt a bit at a disadvantage now that he'd already given them his name.

"I am Tormund," Tormund grunted, drawing himself up proudly. "I am Tall-talker, Horn-blower, and Breaker of Ice. Husband to Bears, the Mead-king of Ruddy Hall, Speaker to Gods, and Father of Hosts. Most men know me as Giantsbane." Colin rose his eyebrows, more than a little impressed. Even _he_ didn't have that many titles, and he was part immortal-scaly-winged-lizard-god.

"The woman on the other side of the fire is Ullte," Tormund continued, gesturing as he spoke. He leaned in and muttered in a low voice, "Try not to make her more angry than she already is or she'll gut you."

"Something tells me she'll try anyway," Colin observed, staring calmly as Ullte glared murder at him.

Tormund drew back and shrugged, shooting a warning look at Ullte who scowled back before staring into the fire. "Aye, she might," Tormund admitted. "It is not our way to shy away from blood and violence."

Fair enough. Colin knew plenty of Nords back home who were the same way. Uthgerd the Unbroken came to mind.

Tormund continued, gesturing to the other two women in their group. "The fire-touched lass to your right is Ygritte, and the golden-haired woman next to her is called Siggy."

 _Ygritte!_ That's _what her name was!_

At least he'd been close.

Ygritte and Siggy both stared at him, one with slight hostility tempered with curiosity and the other with sly amusement. Colin nodded his head to each in turn, earning a raised eyebrow and a grin respectively.

The rest of the introductions were quick and uneventful. Aside from Tormund and the three women, there was a squat man with a pug nose called Sigfried, a lanky yellow-haired man named Gunther, and Kurt, a man with a vicious scar that ruined his left eye, leaving an empty hole that hadn't even been covered with a patch.

After he'd learned everyone's name, Colin grunted and forced himself up to his knees, the bandits watching him the entire time. He made sure he was catching enough light from the fire and then carefully peeled back the fur that had been placed over his shoulder, hissing in pain as reddened, puffy, puss-filled flesh was revealed all around his wound. More than one of the bandits winced their sympathy.

Tormund gave a low whistle at the nauseating sight. "We did the best we could, but we had nothing to boil water in, and nothing cleaner than that fur we wrapped you in."

"I understand," Colin grunted. "Besides, it's nothing I can't fix."

Tormund frowned. "What are you—" He trailed off as the hand Colin held over his wound suddenly glowed like he was holding a piece of the sun.

Rays of magical light—golden and brimming with vitality—danced over infected flesh, purging and cleansing the wound, knitting severed tissue back together until there was just unbroken skin with no sign that the injury had ever been there. For his part, Colin sighed with pure relief as the pain first numbed, then vanished altogether in a comforting warmth. Thank the Divines his father had forced him to learn at least one healing spell before he set off from home. He ended the spell, withdrew his hand, then swung his arm about, testing the range of motion, pausing to stretch whenever he felt resistance.

" _Gods_ ," Tormund croaked. Colin turned to the man and frowned when he saw he was wide-eyed and pale in the face.

"What?" Colin demanded, eyebrows drawing together in confusion. The man sounded like he'd just seen a dragon pluck someone off the ground. Then he noticed the others were deathly silent. Some had even gotten their weapons in their hands, gripping them so tight that their knuckles were beginning to turn white, and they were beginning to point them at him. Their faces were just as pale as Tormund's, and their eyes, wide and full of terror like they were watching a Hagraven come at them with a sacrificial dagger.

The song of his dragon blood began an ominous hymn in the back of his mind. This couldn't be good.

"I told you!" Colin almost flinched as Ullte screamed out of nowhere, aggressively making her way from the other side of the fire. "I told you he had magic!"

That was the only warning Colin got before she chucked her spear at him with a yell. He threw himself out of the way with a strangled yelp, actually _feeling_ the disturbance in the air as it whooshed past his side and buried itself somewhere in the snow behind him. In the ensuing confusion he acted, shoving Gunther out of his way and rolling under the others' strikes, hearing their crude iron weapons swoosh above him before he bolted forward and scooped Dawnbreaker up.

The blade pulsed warmly in his hands, pleased to be reunited with her wielder. She shone even more brightly than before when he turned around with a snarl, and the bandits all gave him a wide berth at the sight.

"So I used magic. What of it?" Colin challenged, ever so slightly shifting in his combat stance. Damn it to Oblivion, he should have known these people were too jumpy for them not to try to kill him. And this wouldn't be the first group of xenophobic "magic is evil!" Nords he'd run into, even if they were only bandits.

"He's not even denying it!" Gunther spat, scrambling off the ground from where Colin had shoved him, grabbing at his wayward axe as he did. "He's a real witch he is!"

There were fearful mutterings all around. Colin couldn't help but snort despite the situation. "Hardly. This heal spell is the only one I know. Besides, _women_ are witches. Men are wizards." He paused, tilting his head as he considered the title. "Or warlocks, I suppose."

"Liar!" Ullte spat, condemnation burning in her gaze. "We _saw_ you! We saw that great fire you conjured!"

"Stand _down_ , Ullte!" Tormund bellowed, roughly shoving the woman back as he put himself between her and Colin. "Do as I say or I swear to all the gods I'll kill you where you stand."

Ullte hesitated a bit before snarling and standing her ground, drawing herself up as tall as she could in challenge. "Why can't any of you see it?! He's got magic! He's evil! A servant of the Others!"

"He _killed_ Others, you pox-scarred lackwit!" Ygritte hissed, taking her place next to Tormund, her bow drawn and pointed straight at Ullte's chest.

Well. That was surprising, and not unwelcome. Colin didn't think Ygritte liked him very much, but apparently it was good to be wrong sometimes.

"And I suppose you saw him do it?" Ullte sneered, bravely (or stupidly) ignoring the fact that one twitch of Ygritte's fingers would mean certain death.

"I _did_ , actually!" Ygritte sneered right back. "Saw one of them roasting in those big flames of his. Besides, where do you think those swords of ice came from?"

"Tormund, we all saw his magic!" Kurt said, somehow managing to keep his single eye on both Colin and Tormund at once. "Are you truly taking his side?"

At that, everyone turned to the red-haired giant whose eyes narrowed at the blatant challenge. He spoke then with a menacing, rumbling growl, "And if I am? Will you challenge me for the right to lead?"

Kurt's eye widened and he quickly shook his head, appearing to forget all about Colin as he tried to climb out of the hole he'd dug for himself. "N-No, Tormund, I was just—"

"Then unless you can best me you will _listen_ or I'll decide it's too much effort to keep you alive." Tormund turned to Colin, regarding Dawnbreaker as she shone in his hand. "Lower your weapon, Colin, and we shall do the same," Tormund offered, although Colin could see that the man was clearly reluctant to offer peace. Was magic really _that_ hated?

From the corner of his eye, he saw Ultte's pox-scarred face filled with absolute hatred. Colin gladly returned the sentiment. He was really starting to hate this wintery shit hole and everyone in it.


End file.
